Matthew Tercsak - Why All Business Leaders Need Accounting Skills

Matthew Tercsak came to the business world from the retail sector. He started his own business, Mystik, Inc., a retail shop in Orlando, Florida in 1995 and quickly found new ways to use his experience and skill managing employees and being responsible for many business operations, as he was as a manager for another store in Pittsburgh. Tercsak took over many regular business operations for his new company and built its reputation from the ground up. Managing a business takes many skills and all of his time, but Tercsak finds it hugely rewarding and loves providing products for his community. 

                                   

Matthew Tercsak quickly found that his skills managing payroll and his basic understanding of accounting were greatly needed. He learned quickly and soon began managing his employees’ payroll concerns and his business’s budget and income. All business leaders need accounting skills to effectively manage their businesses so that they can find ways to cut costs while still increasing income. Budgeting is one of the most important skills all business owners need to make sure that they are not headed for debt when they don’t need to be. At a certain point, it pays to hire a dedicated accountant, but often, when first starting a business, it’s not cost-effective yet, so small business leaders have to work on their balance sheets on their own. 

Matthew Tercsak has built Mystik into a successful business by applying his experience as a manager in Pittsburgh in a retail setting to Mystik. He has learned much over his career.

Matthew Tercsak - Three Ways to Improve Your Professional Writing

Matthew Tercsak took his degree in English from the University of Pittsburgh and used it in a different way than most English graduates do. He used his skill crafting sentences to start a business for himself in Orlando, Florida, after he had gained some experience working in a retail setting as a manager for the local Pittsburgh business Tela Ropa. He has honed his professional writing skills over the years as he has managed his business in Orlando to bring in more customers and revenue. Here are three ways to improve your professional writing: 

• Don’t betray a readers’ trust. At the heart of all good writing in all forms or contexts is the responsibility of the writer to not betray a reader’s trust. In professional writing, when Matthew Tercsak often has to quote facts and figures, he verifies these facts from multiple sources so that readers know they can rely on what he writes.
• Give it a rest. Good writing usually benefits from the writer standing up from the desk and taking a break from it. After writing, editing, and rewriting as necessary, a day or two and another reading will show more things that could be corrected and made better in the writing piece.
• Be concise. Even if you’re getting paid by the word, editors and the purchasers of content appreciate a few words saying the same thing as a thousand. That’s a bit extreme, but professional writers have to be careful with their words to convey a fact or point of view in as little of the reader’s time as possible.

Matthew Tercsak has used his training as a writer and a published poet to the business world, where he crafts consistently effective copy and business communications.

Matthew Tercsak - Three Tips to Improve Your Sales Performance

Matthew Tercsak came to the business world from a different background than many of his colleagues and competitors in Orlando, Florida. He graduated from the University of Pittsburgh with a degree in English with an emphasis on Creative Writing. However, when he moved to Orlando after college, he decided to open his own business there where he could work for himself. He had to learn a bit on the fly about how to manage his business and sell products to customers. If he can do it, so can you. Here are three basic tips to improve your sales performance:

• Clarify your context and your mission. Start to improve your sales performance by understanding exactly what you do best, who needs what you do or sell, and how to approach your prospects. Matthew Tercsak started with these basic foundations and built on them for his business.
• Break down your work into easily identifiable goals. Set your activity goals to make a certain number of calls per week or per month or gain a number of referrals per call, etc. Constantly review your goals and see how you can improve your numbers from week to week.
• Sell to customer needs. Most customers naturally distrust salespeople. Instead of fighting against their natural feelings, sell to what they need. By offering them what they came to you for, you will offer them peace of mind in the form of your products or services.

Matthew Tercsak has helped his business by following a few of these concepts to effectively market and sell his business’s products.

Matthew Tercsak and the Art of Glassblowing

In Matthew Tercsak's Orlando specialty shop, Mystik Inc., many of the pieces that he sells are created from blown glass. He has always appreciated the art form of glassblowing, and taken the time to learn more about the ancient style of art over the years. In recent years, he has also started blowing glass on his own, which deepened his love of the art form.

To accurately achieve the glass form, raw materials must be super-heated to an extreme level, two thousand four hundred degrees Fahrenheit. The earliest pieces of glass were not created by humans, but by mother nature herself. During a volcanic eruption, molten lava would rain down over areas of sand and rock, melting the two elements to their liquid state. The resulting mass would cool and become the form of glass known as obsidian. Alternately, a lighting strike in sand could melt that sand into the glass called fulgurite.

The art of glassblowing, forming molten glass into a shape by applying breath-pressure, dates as far back as the early Roman Empire. Artisans would use kilns and forges to melt glass pieces, dip the end of a long metal tube into the glass, and blow through the opposite end to create a shape before the glass cooled. Since the Roman Empire had such an impact around Europe, the art of glassblowing caught on more quickly.

Glassblowers in modern times, like Matthew Tercsak, use either mold-blowing or free-blowing techniques to create beautiful glass artwork all around the world.

Matthew Tercsak Promotes Great Customer Service

Business owner Matthew Tercsak values great customer service, which is why he teaches his staff at Mystik Inc. to treat every customer like a treasured guest. Having a reputation for high customer service standards has helped his small retail store to remain popular for more than twenty years. He teaches the following lessons to his staff to ensure they take care of the customers correctly.

• A genuine smile is the best way to start any customer interaction. Even if the customer is not in the store but calling on the phone, a smiling associate will convey their happiness to be of help. Customers want to feel that they are being taken care of, and that their business is valued. This means that a smile and respectful greeting will go a lot further than ignoring the customer or pretending to be busy.
• Very few customers appreciate a sales associate that hovers in their social space (eight to ten feet away) or constantly asks if they need anything. Those shoppers need to have time to look at merchandise and think about their purchase. However, it is always a wise decision to ask up front if they need help or are looking for anything in particular.
• There will be some customers who do not want to spend the time locating a specific item and will want that help right away. If while discreetly watching the customer shop the associate sees they are becoming confused or need help, then approach again and offer assistance, a trick that works for Matthew Tercsak.

Matthew Tercsak Employs Benefits Management Tools

Running a small business in the retail sector, much like Matthew Tercsak's Mystik Inc. shop, calls for a more creative level of thinking. As an independent store that is not tied to a larger corporation, the responsibilities fall directly on Mr. Tercsak and his staff. Maintaining profit and a good reputation in the community requires the implementation of special projects and sales concepts. Those projects are more fruitful when the following Benefits Management tools are used.

                                                 

• When considering a new project in the small-business retail field, the owner should understand exactly why they are attempting or considering the undertaking. Having a specialized sale, simply for the sake of having a sale, will not be as effective. Instead, the owner should think about the reasons for putting an item on sale, such as an overstock issue. If there is no clear answer to the “why” of the project, it is not worth the time and energy.

• Benefits Management also dictates that the owner understands beforehand what they expect to happen as a result of the project. In the sale scenario, is the owner anticipating a certain level of profit? Maybe they are expecting the sale on item A to also bring in profits from the sale of item B. By creating an expectation and setting a standard, it is easier to work toward and surpass that goal.

• The concept of Benefits Management also requires the owner to place a value on the proposed project, determining if the endeavor is truly worth it, a task that Matthew Tercsak handles with ease.

Matthew Tercsak Offers Marketing Help for Small Businesses

Professionals like Matthew Tercsak who make the leap into the small business realm understand that good marketing can make or break a company. After twenty years of business ownership in Florida, Mr. Tercsak knows a thing or two about small business marketing. Here he shares some of his most effective tips and tricks for new small businesses in any area.

• Businesses that sell products will find no better marketing option than that of the free sample. If possible, attend local events near the business or store's location and offer free giveaways. While this may not seem cost effective to a manager, the end result will far outweigh the cost of offering their product for free. This is especially helpful for businesses that sell edible products.
• Some of the best small business marketers make the effort to be active in their community. This could mean attending events, creating and hosting events, volunteering for charities, or choosing to lead their own organizations. Any of these options will draw attention to the business, which in turn will draw customers or clients.
• An incredibly cost effective marketing method for small businesses is to start a podcast. As social media and all forms of Internet communication become the mainstream method for interacting with others, the podcast serves as a useful tool to market a business.
• If the business owner has a certain talent that could be useful to someone else, sharing that skill is a great marketing technique. These tools have helped Matthew Tercsak remain relevant in marketing.